One of those (joyful) days

One of the many joys of having different roles in the same institution, is the days when those roles come together.

In my Art for Classroom Teachers course at Columbia University Teachers College (TC), I teach graduate students from all programs across the college. Students who are not art majors, but want to create ways of incorporating art processes and ideas in their practices - be that 11th grade chemistry teaching, occupational therapy, literacy, elementary school teaching, or school psychotherapy.

One of the final assignments for this course is a play, a puppet show put together using the materials explored along the semester: collage, paint, construction, digital materials, sound, clay, printmaking, etc. Students put a lot of work and care into creating a story and all the characters, props, settings, and other aspects of it, and are proud to share their work in a class celebration.

This semester, as they presented their work in class, we had the toddlers and preschoolers I teach at the Rita Gold Center (TC’s on campus lab school) come to be an active and engaged audience to the play. It was wonderful to see how the adults provided opportunities for the children to participate and engage and how the children, in turn, offered the best of their attention, questions, and suggestions. And, of course, popcorn. It’s a play, after all…

Today was one of those days: a perfect work morning, in which your (toddler, preschool, and graduate) students come together in one room, to explore the world together. Thank you, everyone!